Scooby Doobie Dean
by elfinblue
Summary: An old ally returns - and decides Dean needs a vacation. No slash, no pairings, mostly silliness. Vague spoilers for season 8. Rated T for language and adult themes. Deleted and re-posted because ffnet ate my scene breaks.


**Author's note: This is my first Supernatural fanfic and my first fanfic in several years. I had fun writing it and I hope someone has fun reading it. I considered calling it a crossover, but the second universe isn't treated as real so I decided to make it just a straight story.**

**Rated T for language, a few irreverent drug references and a little bit of smutty humor. No slash, no pairings, vague spoilers for season 8 and I apologize for being mean to Freddy. Unbetaed - all errors are mine.**

**Disclaimer: I'd say I own nothing, but, honestly, even my nothing is borrowed or leased. This is only written to amuse myself and, hopefully, others.**

Scooby Doobie Dean

by

Elfinblue

The motel room was like something out of the sixties. Big, geometric designs in bold colors covered the wallpaper, a framed peace sign hung on the wall between the beds, the bedspreads were paisley and there was a fuzzy, pink footprint decal stuck on the refrigerator.

"Geez," Dean said, dropping his duffel and the weapons bag on the bed nearest the door and looking around in dismay. "Did I drop acid without noticing it or am I really seeing this?"

"Not funny," Sam sniped, dropping his own bag on the other bed and carrying a plastic grocery sack over to the kitchenette.

Dean blinked, "what crawled up your ass and died?"

Sam made a face. "I just don't think joking about drug use is appropriate."

"Really?" Dean raised his eyebrows. "'Cause, given the decor, I think drug jokes are highly appropriate. I mean, c'mon, Sam! It was the sixties. Free love. Timothy O'Leary. Tune in, turn on and drop out. And the music was classic. Even if, y'know, a lot of it kind of sucked."

"Yeah, and how many of those classic sixties musicians died of drug use, _Dean_? And even the ones that didn't . . . have you seen Keith Richards lately?"

"Oh, yeah? Well, you know Davy Jones? First one of the Monkees to die? Vegetarian health nut. Ran every day. Fact."

Sam rolled his eyes and stooped down to put their perishables in the refrigerator and Dean shrugged and set about placing the salt lines and rolling out a doormat in front of the door. The top of the doormat was an unremarkable dark blue. There was a devil's trap painted on the underside. They'd come up with the portable trap as a way to keep from leaving a trail of vandalized hotel rooms that any cop (or demon, or demon cop) with half a brain could follow.

If he was honest with himself, Sam knew he was being pissy and unreasonable. Under other circumstances, he might have been making druggie jokes himself. But it had been a long week and a long car ride and he was missing Amelia. Worse, he was missing Riot. _It was __my__ dog_, he thought. _I should have sued for custody._ He looked again around the psychedelic horror of a hotel room and thought about what it would be like to have a pet on the road, and the probable life span of anything helpless that a Winchester admitted to caring about, and his mood blackened further.

To make it worse, the more time he spent with his brother, the more he was realizing that Dean wasn't exactly 100% back from Purgatory yet. He slept in fits and starts, dozing off only to jerk into panicked wakefulness, and he was barely eating enough to sustain himself. Half the time he'd forget to eat at all if Sam didn't remind him, and he hadn't begun to replace the body mass he'd lost while he was gone.

But would Dean talk about it? Of course not. Just the night before, he'd jumped from a sound sleep to a defensive crouch in the corner, brandishing his knife in one hand and a lamp in the other. When Sam pressed him to share his bad dream, he'd just muttered "midgets" before crawling back into bed and feigning sleep.

Sam wondered if that was because talking about Purgatory meant talking about Benny, and if Dean resented his brother for asking him to break off his friendship with the vampire. Dean had never had very many friends in his life. It had to be hard to walk away from one of the only two still standing.

The whole thing left Sam feeling worried and excluded and just a touch - okay, maybe more than just a touch - resentful himself. The more he tried to bury those feelings, the more he ended up acting pissy.

"So, Samantha," Dean said. (Sam gritted his teeth.) "Y'wanna catch a movie tonight? Flip on the TV and we'll see what's on." He indicated the ancient little box-type television sitting on the dresser opposite the beds. "I'm warning you, though. I don't care how bad your PMS is, I'm not doing Breakfast at Tiffany's."

Sam opened his mouth, but whatever retort he might have come up with died unspoken as a knock sounded at the motel room door.

The two brothers exchanged a look. "Did you order a pizza or something?" Sam asked, though he knew his brother hadn't.

Dean shook his head. "You?"

"No."

Sam drew his handgun. Dean pulled out a knife and they flanked the door.

"Who is it?" Dean called.

A muffled voice answered, words indistinct.

"Mrs. Arlsburgerhhh?"

"What?"

"Mrs. Johannesburrr? Melsea Smurchalter?"

"What the fuck?"

"Uh, flowers."

"Flowers for who?"

"Whom," Sam corrected softly. Dean shot him an annoyed look and Sam shrugged.

"Plumber."

"We don't need a plumber."

"Candygram."

Dean looked at Sam, brows drawn together. "Dude! Is it just me, or is this joker doing the Land Shark skit from Saturday Night Live?"

Sam thought about it for a second. "Uh, yeah, actually."

With an annoyed shake of his head, Dean yanked the door open and the two lunged forward to confront . . . nothing. The sidewalk was empty and, except for the Impala, the parking lot was bare.

"Where'd they go?"

Sam shook his head. "Could be hiding behind the car. Or under it."

"Right. Keep an eye out. I'll grab a flashlight and go look."

Sam nodded, keeping his eyes on the lot, but a sharp, quick intake of breath from his brother made him turn around. The hotel room had changed.

Oh, the garish, sixties decor was unfortunately intact. But the beds were gone. In their place, facing the television, stood a massive, plush white sofa. Lounging in the far corner of said sofa, munching on a giant Nestle's Crunch Bar, sat none other than the Archangel Gabriel.

"You're alive!" Dean was a bit bi-polar at the best of times and the delight in his voice quickly turned to anger. "Where the hell have you been, you asshat?"

"I just love humans," Gabriel said to the room at large. "I'm so glad I stood up to my brother and got skewered on their behalf."

"Damn it! I thought you were dead. I thought I got you killed trying to help us, and instead you just, what? Ran away and hid? Again? Do you know what we had to go through to stop the Apocalypse? And everything we've been fighting since? We _needed_ you!"

"And speaking of needing things," Gabriel said, "you know what this room needs? This room needs a disco ball."

He snapped his fingers and suddenly there was a disco ball glittering overhead.

"Don't try to changed the subject," Dean growled. "Sam had to jump into the pit to stop Lucifer."

"Well, you obviously got him back. Although I suppose a stint downstairs would explain his attitude problem. No. Wait. He had that before."

"Damn it, Gabriel! I can still get my hands on an angel blade. You don't start talking real fast and I WILL end you!"

"Will you, though?" Gabriel asked. "With an angel blade? Because that's what Lucy used and, while it certainly wiped out the archangel Gabriel, it doesn't seem to have had much effect on a certain pagan god we all know and love."

"Loki," Sam said. "You're Gabriel, but you're also the Norse god Loki. So . . . what? Are you saying Lucifer killed you as Gabriel but you survived as Loki?"

"Seems so."

"Huh. Schizo much?"

Gabriel/Loki ignored Dean. He finished his candy bar, snapped his fingers, and the empty wrapper was replaced with a red and white striped bag full of chocolate caramel corn. "So, when Lucy skewered me he pretty much killed my angel mojo, but I was still alive as Loki. The only thing, though, is that pagan gods get their juice from being worshiped and, as completely unbelievable as it is to me, I don't seem to have many followers anymore. So, while I would have liked to help you out on all your fun little saving-the-world adventures, I couldn't."

"But you're here now," Sam observed. "What changed?"

"Yeah, that's a funny thing. Some moron went and made a movie about Thor. Thor! Can you believe it? What a prima donna. I mean, why would anyone want to make a movie about a wet blanket like Thor? Do you know he hasn't even spoken to me since I changed his hammer into a giant dildo? Some gods have no sense of humor."

"So they made a movie about Thor. And that's relevant because . . . ?"

"Loki's in the movie, too." It was Sam who answered. He was beginning to get a glimmer of understanding. "But, he was the villain."

Gabriel waved a hand. "Villain schmillain. The important thing is, I was in there. And, since any character based on me is guaranteed to be waaaaay cooler than any character based on Thor, I've got a following again!"

"A following?" Sam asked, skeptical? "Do movie fans count as a following?"

"What is a following if not fans? And fans nowadays tend to be really active fans. Fan fiction, fan art, fan videos, fan poetry. Granted, some of it's really bad fan poetry. But that's not important. What's important is, it all counts as forms of worship."

"And now you're all juiced up again."

"Juiced up and ready to help?" Dean persisted.

"That's why I'm here, visiting you in this lovely," he looked around at the room, "psychehellic dell."

"Okay!" Dean was immediately all gung ho. "How much do you know about what's going on? Can you help us protect the prophet? And we need to retrieve the other half of the Word of God from Crowley and if you could just roast that bastard . . . ."

"Dean. Dean. Dean." Gabriel held up a hand. "Just slow down. You've got to remember that I don't have any angel mojo anymore. I'm juiced up, yeah, but I'm juiced up as a fanfiction-powered pagan god. My help's going to have to be little more . . . circumspect."

"Circumspect? What? What do you mean, circumspect?"

"Think of me more in a support capacity. You know, giving you what you need to help you function at peak efficiency. And, oh my Dad, I am not a moment too soon. I mean, _look_ at you two. Sam's got serious anger management issues and you - you, Dean-o - are a mess! PTSD, hyper-vigilant, exhausted, under-nourished, haunted by nightmares and latent feelings of being unwanted and abandoned!"

Dean squinted at him, mouth drawn down in disapproval. "You came back from the dead to play Dr. Phil?"

"Hey, if anyone needs therapy, it's you two chuckleheads. And, for my first prescription, you, Dean, need (drum roll, please) . . . a vacation!" He snapped his fingers again and Dean was gone.

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

Dean stood on a dark mountainside, next to a narrow, two-lane blacktop. Around him, leafless trees swayed in the wind, the few dead leaves left on their shivering branches rattling ominously. Clouds scudded across a full moon. Lightning flashed overhead and thunder rumbled.

"Great vacation spot, you flying dickhead," Dean yelled at the sky. "What? You couldn't send me to Maui?" Grumbling to himself about the iniquity of supernatural beings in general and ones named Gabriel and/or Loki in particular, he looked left and right, up and down the road, and wondered which way he should go.

To the right, uphill, there were only trees and empty road and a shadow that might have been a big, dark house far in the distance. But when he looked downhill, to his left, he found a set of round headlights approaching. They were attached to a big, boxy vehicle. Some kind of van, he realized, but it irked him that he couldn't tell exactly what kind. He was not an amateur when it came to any kind of automobile and could generally identify anything, even in the dark, but this thing didn't fit cleanly into any category. It resembled a Ford Econoline or a mid-sixties Chevy, but it also had characteristics of a VW.

Lightning flashed again as the van slowed, revealing a bright, blue and green paint job and writing on the side.

Dean sighed and shook his head. "Really?"

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

"DEAN!" Sam's shout was deep and guttural and desperate. He launched himself at Gabriel, driving the pagan god back into the corner of the sofa by the sheer force of his attack. "Bring him back!"

"You know, you're moving a little fast there," Gabriel joked. "I usually don't put out on a first date."

"Bring. Him. Back."

"Okay, you're right. I usually do."

"I'm not doing this again. Do you hear me? I'm not doing it again! People keep taking my brother away and I'm supposed to just go on and be all right with that? It doesn't work like that. I only just got him back from Purgatory and so help me God, I'm _damned_ if I'll let you have him!"

"Or what?" Gabriel asked, sounding bored. "You'll get out the angel blade? 'Cause we've already discussed how well that'd work."

Sam let go of Gabriel, stood and drew himself up to his full height. He was perfectly aware that he was trying to intimidate a god but he didn't even care.

"If there is anyone in the world who can figure out how to kill a pagan god, it's me. Do you want a list of the ones I've already taken down?"

"You know, you're really no fun at all. Dean's fine. I'm not going to hurt him. Heck, I like the big, angsty, self-flagellating chucklehead. I just sent him off to have a little fun and maybe unwind a bit. Now, you just sit down and try to relax. Watch a little TV with me and after the show's over, I promise, I'll bring big brother back. Okay?"

Never taking his eyes off Gabriel, Sam reluctantly lowered himself to the other end of the sofa. "If you hurt him . . . ."

"Geez! He's fine!" Gabriel looked around. "This sofa, though, is totally wrong for this decor." He snapped his fingers and, without Sam feeling any change, the white sofa morphed into a Danish Modern horror in an eye-watering red and tan design that clashed spectacularly with everything else in the room. "Much better. You know, I really miss the sixties. It was a great time to be a trickster. Stoners will believe pretty much anything. Did I ever tell you how I started a fad for smoking banana peels? And pet rocks? That was me."

He grinned over at Sam.

Sam glared back, entirely unamused.

Gabriel shrugged and pointed in front of them and Sam looked to find the ancient little television had been replaced by a wall-mounted 70-inch flat screen HDTV. It turned on as he was looking at it. The last notes of a familiar theme song were just fading away.

"Scooby-doo! Where are you?" a voice sang out.

"Cartoons?" he asked, voice heavy with skepticism.

"Shh!" Gabriel shushed. "Just watch."

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

The opening credits gave way to a shot of the Mystery Machine putt-putting along, slowly climbing a narrow, two-lane blacktop that wound its way up the side of a mountain. Wind tossed the bare branches of winter-naked trees and rustled through the few remaining dry leaves like a death rattle. Clouds scudded across the moon. Thunder rumbled and the brief flare from a flash of lightning showed a familiar, leather-jacketed figure waiting by the side of the road.

Sam blinked. "Seriously?"

Gabriel had conjured up two small paper cups full of soda. He handed one towards Sam, then hesitated. "Are we in New York City?"

"What? No, why?"

"Just checking." The two cups super-sized themselves and he pushed one into Sam's hands. Sam took it absently, still staring at the television.

On the screen, the picture switched to the inside of the Mystery Machine.

"Oh, look!" Velma said. "There's a guy up there standing beside the road."

"We should stop and see if he needs a ride," Daphne suggested.

Freddy made a face. "I don't think it's a good idea to pick up hitchhikers."

"You thought it was a good idea when we found Josie and the Pussycats broken down by the side of the road," Daphne said archly.

"That was because they were a bunch of girls. It would have been mean to leave them stranded."

"And this is a guy in the middle of nowhere, all alone on a stormy night," Velma's voice was firm. "It would be mean to leave him stranded, too."

"But we don't know anything about him."

"We know one thing," Shaggy put in. "Look at his haircut. This dude is a total square."

(Sam snickered in spite of himself.)

"The least we can do is stop and ask if he needs any help," Daphne said reasonably.

("And already the females are on his side," Sam sighed.)

"Oh, all right." Freddy gave in ungraciously. "Heck, he probably won't want to come with us, once he finds out where we're going."

He pulled up and stopped beside the man in the leather jacket and Velma rolled the window down.

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

The Mystery Machine pulled up alongside Dean and the passenger window rolled down to reveal Velma sitting by the door, Daphne in the middle of the front seat and Freddy driving. Shaggy and Scooby lounged in the back.

"Do you have a problem?" Velma asked. She and Daphne looked friendly and interested. Freddy looked annoyed and Shaggy mostly looked stoned. For that matter, Scooby looked stoned, too.

Huh.

Knowing where his allies were, Dean gave the girls his most charming, sparkly-eyed grin. "Yeah, actually. Hi, I'm Dean. Dean Winchester. I seem to be stranded up here. Do you think you could maybe give me a ride?"

Velma and Daphne, he could see, were more than ready to welcome him in. Freddy seemed decidedly less hospitable.

"Well, we'd like to," he said. "But we're not headed back to town and I don't know if you'd want to go with us."

"Oh? Why's that? Where are you headed, anyway?"

"We're going," Freddy dropped his voice dramatically, "on a _ghost_ hunt."

Dean's grin broadened. "Awesome. Sounds like fun."

"I don't know if I'd call it fun," Freddy said seriously. "Mirkstone Manor is an awfully creepy old house. It could easily be haunted. And not just ghosts, either! There could be witches, or zombies, or vampires, or a mummy or even a swamp creature in the old, dank pond out back."

Dean pursed his lips and shrugged slightly, expression bright. "Cool. Count me in!"

"Well if you're sure," Freddy was disappointed, "I guess you can ride in the back with Shaggy and Scooby."

"Thanks," Dean said. "Thank you. That's very kind of you." He pulled open the back door and climbed in. _I'll just try not to get a contact high off Shaggy's goatee,_ he thought to himself.

He slammed the door and they started putt-putting their way up the mountain once more. They went about a hundred yards, then stopped abruptly and backed back down again to find Shaggy and Scooby cowering in the bushes.

"Ghosts! And witches! And zombies too?" Shaggy quavered.

"It's okay," Daphne soothed. "Freddy was just teasing Dean."

"Maybe," Shaggy conceded doubtfully. "But me and Scooby still think it'd be safer for us to just wait here."

Dean rolled down the back window so he could enter into the conversation. "Really? Are you sure about that? Because there's a lot of scary things you could find roaming along a dark road at night."

"There are?" Shaggy's voice shook. "Really?"

"Absolutely. Ghost cars, phantom hitchhikers, ghouls, trolls, centipedes."

"Centipedes?" Freddy echoed. "There's nothing supernatural about centipedes."

"No, but you gotta admit, they're creepy. All those little legs running along. Ugh!"

Shaggy and Scooby dithered in the bushes, scared to stay and scared to go.

"Okay, guys," Velma said, her voice enticing, "I'll tell you what. If you get back in the van, I'll give you each a Scooby snack."

Shaggy looked to Scooby for advice and Scooby made a noise that might, with sufficient imagination, be interpreted as "two".

"Two Scooby snacks?" Shaggy bargained.

"Okay," Velma sighed. "Two Scooby snacks."

"Three?" he tried hopefully.

"Nope, no deal. I guess we'll just have to leave them here," Velma said.

Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled overhead and Dean was nearly squished in the stampede as teenager and dog fought their way back into the van.

"But we still get two Scooby snacks each, though, right? Right?"

"Of course you do." Velma took a box from the glove compartment and tossed four dog biscuits into the back seat. Shaggy and Scooby each ate two of them with great relish. Then they relaxed and drooped against each other with happy sighs.

"Munchies?" Dean asked.

Shaggy patted his stomach. "You have no idea!"

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

"Jujubes?" Gabriel offered.

"No, thank you," Sam said in that tone of voice that means, _I really despise you and everything you stand for, but I'm just too good a person to be openly rude._

"Raisinettes?"

"No."

"Sour Patch Kids? Whoppers? Red Hots? Good-n-Plenty?"

"No. Gah. Those things are disgusting!"

"Mike-n-Ike? Reese's Pieces? M and M's? Sugar Babies?"

"No _thank_ you."

"Mango, mandarin orange, apple, and jicama salad on a bed of romaine hearts with honey-roasted, pomegranate-flavored almonds and raspberry vinaigrette dressing?"

"No! I . . . uh, actually, yeah. That sounds pretty good."

Gabriel passed over the salad with a grimace. "Oh, my Dad! You need an intervention!"

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

"So," Dean said, "tell me about this Mirkstone Manor."

It was Velma who answered him. "It was built by a man named Ambrose Mirkstone for his new bride, Cynthia, way, way back in the 1880's. At first, they were very happy, but it wasn't fated to last."

"First," Daphne took up the story, "all three of their children died of scarlet fever. Then Cynthia drowned in the estate pond. Poor Ambrose was driven mad by grief and hanged himself from the tower. Bur first he put a curse on the mansion, so that no one else would ever be happy where he had known nothing but sorrow. Isn't that sad?"

"Yes," Dean agreed. "Very sad. And really gruesome." _This is a kids' show? _"So, what are you guys planning to do up there?"

"We're going up to help my Uncle Harry," Shaggy said.

"Is that Uncle Harry or Uncle Hairy? Or is Harry hairy?"

"Huh?"

"Never mind. So, uh, why does Uncle Harry need help?"

It was Freddie who finally took up the story, tired, perhaps, of being ignored. "Shaggy's Uncle Harry inherited the manor as part of the estate of his Great-Aunt Martha. But to claim his inheritance he has to break the curse by spending an entire night in the manor, from dusk to dawn, by the second full moon after her death."

Dean glanced out the van's window, to where the incoming storm clouds were trying to hide the full moon. "Let me guess - tonight?"

"He's tried it before," Velma said, "but every time the ghost came and scared him away. Tonight is his last chance. If he doesn't spend the night tonight, the entire estate will go to his greedy cousin Garvin."

"Well," Dean said brightly, "we can't have that now, can we?"

"I've got a plan, though," Freddy said. He gave Dean a sideways, resentful look in the rear-view mirror. "You can help, I guess," he said, "if you're not too scared. But you have to do as I say."

"Let me guess," Dean said. "Does this plan involve an insanely complicated trap with a net and ropes and Shaggy and Scooby acting as bait?"

"Er, um, yeah. How did you know that?"

"Just a crazy, wild hunch."

As they all turned their attention back to the road, Freddie reached over and flipped on the radio. The sound of Tiny Tim singing Tiptoe Through The Tulips filled the van. Dean sank down in his seat, groaned inwardly and hoped it was a short drive.

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

"So," Sam said, "Dean's a hunter. He's spends his whole life tracking down and fighting the supernatural. You decide he needs a break so . . . you send him on a ghost hunt?"

Gabriel let his head roll sideways along the back of the sofa so he was looking at Sam. "You'd rather be watching your brother in animee?"

"So, ghost hunt. Good idea!"

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

Mirkstone Manor, as Dean had expected, turned out to be big and dark, with shadowy corners and long, echoing corridors. When they arrived, no one was waiting for them. They were a little concerned that something had happened to Uncle Harry already, but they quickly found him cowering in the hall closet, clutching a pillow and hiding under an old quilt. Uncle Harry was basically an older, shaggier version of Shaggy and it was obvious that he was going to be no help.

Shaggy and Scooby volunteered to stay in the closet with Uncle Harry and "protect" him, but Freddy wouldn't hear of it, because he needed them to be bait for his trap. Whining pitifully, they set off to search the east wing of the manor. Velma and Daphne took the west wing and Dean wandered off by himself while Freddy was busy building his trap.

By the time he was done with his contraption, Daphne had found a footprint that didn't belong to anyone who should have been on the property and Velma had discovered a trap door and a web of secret passages that someone pretending to be a ghost could use to appear and disappear.

"Okay, you guys," Freddy said, "here's the plan. The girls and I will hide behind the stairwell. Shaggy, you and Scooby flush out the ghost and get him to chase you. When he does, run down this hallway. After you're safely past us, I'll trip the trigger mechanism and the net will come down and catch the ghost."

"Wait!" Daphne said, "where's Dean?"

They looked around, but Dean was nowhere to be seen.

"Maybe he's hiding in the closet with Uncle Harry," Freddy suggested. "Or maybe he got scared and decided to walk back to town."

"He didn't seem like the type to get scared, from what I could tell," Velma said. "What if he's hurt? Or someone's holding him prisoner somewhere?"

"Look, let's just catch the ghost first. Then, if he doesn't turn up, we'll go look for him. Okay?"

The girls reluctantly agreed. Shaggy and Scooby, even more reluctantly and after being bribed with FOUR Scooby snacks apiece, finally agreed to play bait. Freddy's plan was set into motion. It very quickly fell apart.

First, the ghost appeared from entirely the wrong direction. He pushed Daphne down the stairs and locked Velma behind the gate of the old-fashioned elevator. When Shaggy and Scooby saw him where they weren't expecting him, they panicked (or, more accurately, panicked MORE) and ran into the trigger mechanism too early, causing Freddy to get caught in his own net. Leaving the Mystery, Inc. team in a muddle, the shrouded figure charged down the hallway towards Uncle Harry's closet.

At the last minute, Dean melted out of the shadows of a pillar he'd been quietly standing behind. He stuck out one arm and closelined the ghost and it dropped, gagging to the hall floor.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Did that hurt you? You know, for a ghost, you sure are corporeal."

("Did my brother just use the word 'corporeal'?" Sam asked.

"He's trying to impress the chicks."

"Ah. Right. Silly me.")

Dean picked up Daphne and dusted her off, freed Velma from the elevator and calmed Shaggy and Scooby - at least as much as it was possible to calm them without the use of medicinal herbs. Ignoring Freddy, who was still tied up in the net and complaining vociferously, he led the other four over to the downed spirit. Shaggy got Uncle Harry to come out and watch as Velma pulled off the "phantom's" head to reveal - big surprise - greedy Cousin Garvin.

When the sheriff arrived, Garvin mostly just sat and glowered while Velma explained his scheme to cheat his cousin out of his inheritance by dressing up and pretending to be the ghost of Mirkstone Manor. He did find his voice, just before they led him away, to declare, "and I'd have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn't for these pesky kids."

Dean sighed, turned away and addressed the universe at large. "Why doesn't anything ever say that to me, before I gank it? Huh?"

The universe, sadly, declined to answer.

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

The next morning dawned bright and clear. While Shaggy was saying goodbye to his Uncle, Dean finished loading the van. The last thing he brought out was Freddy, still wrapped tightly in the cocoon of his net.

"This is nuts," Freddy complained. "Are you sure you're not carrying a knife."

"Nope, sorry," Dean said. "I am not carrying _a_ knife." And technically, that was true. He wasn't carrying a knife. He was carrying five or six of them. He lay the blond teenager gently in the back of the van and didn't apparently notice that Freddy's scarf was accidentally stuffed in his mouth in the process.

"Oh, by the way," Dean tossed over his shoulder as he walked away, "I noticed the Mystery Machine was running a little rough, so I did a little work on her. Hope you don't mind."

Roaring like an angry tiger, the Mystery Machine careened down the mountain, taking the sharp curves at breakneck speeds under Dean's skilled hands. Daphne and Velma bounced excitedly on the front seat beside him. Freddy, still tied up in the back, had managed to spit out his scarf and was trying to bribe Shaggy and Scooby into untying him. They were too busy clinging to one another and shrieking in terror to pay him any attention, though.

"Now, remember," Dean told the girls, "you can't go wrong with The Beatles." He hit the button on the radio and Twist and Shout blared out. The three of them started singing along. When the song ended, he caught them with his most charming smile.

"So, has either of you ladies ever tried a three-way?"

Daphne and Velma looked at each other, shrugged in innocent confusion, and and answered him in unison.

"A three-way what?"

Dean just grinned.

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

Sam covered his face with his hand. "Please tell me this isn't showing anywhere little kids can see it."

Gabriel smiled enigmatically.

"Anyway, the show's over. You said you'd bring him back when the show was over."

"Aw, c'mon, Sam. Why not let the guy have a little fun?"

"He doesn't need to have fun. He's had enough fun. What he needs is to be back here where I know he's safe and you're not just messing with me. And he really doesn't need to be off somewhere corrupting cartoon characters. I mean it, Gabriel. You've seen me with sharp objects. Do you really want to go there again?"

"You know what I think?"

"I don't care what you think."

"Well, you should, because it's about you. Besides, I'm going to tell you, like it or not, so you might as well at least pretend you're being polite to the _god_ in your hotel room. What I think is that you need to do something to work off some of that latent hostility."

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

Three danishes, a gallon of rocky road ice cream and a chocolate-chip pizza later, Gabriel snapped his fingers and Dean re-appeared in the hotel room. His hair was mussed, his over shirt buttoned crooked, and lipstick kisses in two different colors decorated his face.

"Wow," he grinned, "y'know, animated chicks are really . . . animated!" He looked around the room and his eyes narrowed. "Where's Sam?"

"Oh, he's fine," Gabriel said, waving one hand dismissively. "He just needed a little therapy. Have a seat and I'll show you."

Dean dropped tiredly onto the sofa. "I don't suppose you could do anything about this room while you're here?"

"Do something? Why? I love this room."

"Yeah, you would."

"Hey, did I ever tell you how I introduced Sonny and Cher? You see, it was back way before they got famous . . . ."

**SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL - SUPERNATURAL**

Sam was angry.

No, Sam was beyond angry. Sam was furious. He'd had it with Dean, hiding his own problems, misinterpreting everything Sam did and flat refusing to talk out their differences. He'd had it with Gabriel, the smug, know-it-all bastard. He'd had it with angels manipulating them and demons trying to kill them and always having to give up something in order to keep from losing something else.

_He wrapped his talons around the biggest rock he could find._

But most of all . . . .

_Stretching powerful wing muscles, he pulled himself into the sky._

Most of _all_ . . . .

_With a vengeful shriek he dived._

_Most_ of all, he'd absolutely _had it_ with those goddamned, sniggering pigs!

The End


End file.
